Battle for the Wasteland
by dragontank1414
Summary: The Capital Wasteland and the Mojave Wasteland have each found peace in one form or another. But, much of the once proud land of the free is still a dystopian nightmare. These two forces are bound to clash at some moment. Another force will rise out of the shadows and a war will ensue


It had been seven years since The Lone Wanderer, James, who changed his name in honor of his father, had aided the Brotherhood of Steel in annialating what would be considered one of the greatest threats to the Capital Wasteland. A wasteland now referred to as Capital Progress, thanks to his efforts. As trees begin to grow once again across the wastes along with other vegitation, and the water in the basin had been purified, scientists in Rivet city set hard at work, learning to reverse genetic mutations in the many creatures of the  
Capital Progress, learning how to genetically alter brain fuctions in order to decrease hostile behavior. A movement was created to eradicate the use, distribution, and manufacturing of drugs, as a means to reduce the numbers of the raiders, as they became more troublesome following the fall of the Enclave. With Pittsburg steel going into every reconstructed building and monument, and trade established with the Commonwealth, all men and women of the Capital wastes were able to find work, and schools were founded with teachers using materials that were found across every corner of the wastes from old reading books to science and math textbooks. Thankfully, schematics for a printing press was found and Miora, James' wife and lead of Engineering and Mechanics of the Capital Progress set to work printing copies from old textbooks. The Dickerson Tabernackle Church became the center for revitalized, organized faith, with scripture found in the basement being a sign to those of religious views that this place shall be their home. James set his site on the western horizon, preparing to journey west to settle the rest of the United States, to carry with him peace and order.

New Vegas no longer had to worry of any threats, but the Courier Lillie used her army of robots to instill a violent order. After California was exterminated and the NCR was no more, Lillie looked east and left California to be settled. She led the large battalion of robots forward into battle. It was with these robots, ranging from Protectitrons to Sentry Bots, that she slowly crept further and further into Legion territory, wiping out the disorganized tribes of bandits that once stood united under the flag of the Bear. These tribes retreated further and further east, and behind the front lines advanced groups of settlers, trader and prospectors who would come to live in eastern Nevada, Western Utah, And north Western Arizona. These robots need no rest, do not flinch when shot, with their heavily upgraded onboard systems and reconstructed firing components allowing them to tear through any resistance. Lillie seen the machine as the perfect soldier, and she tirelessly worked to upgrade them to get the most out of them, her Protectitrons pace almost able to match a human at jogging pace, Robobrains and Sentry Bots alike capable of vaporizing flesh and metal with ease. Lillie was not without mercy however, those who displayed no hostility were left to become part of "The Liberation March". A march she would command to the span of the once strong Nation. So, it was inevitable that these two forces should clash. It was thought in both respective lands peace had been found, but war, war never changes.

James turns to Elder Lyons, her blonde hair and blue eyes are stunning, her beauty contrasted by the large Tb-60 model armor she wore. Though these newly developed models of power armor were lighter, less bulky, less encumbering and more sleek looking, not much different in appearance to 16th century armor, but slightly bulkier, they still weighed close to 25 pounds and still made male and female impossible to distinguish. Lyons raises an eyebrow "So, where will we start our campaign, and what is it you are hoping to accomplish?" He clears his throat, syncing his pipboy to the portable holoscreen. I sure do love that genius wife of mine he thinks to himself as the map of the United States appears on screen. "The plan here is to push all our units forward along this path north west towards Detroit" He traces his finger along the screen and this route shows up on the map screen. "At key points here, here, here and here, a detachment of 20 led by a member of the Lyon's Pride will settle this region, in order to cement a route to and from Detroit." These dots are placed at evenly spaced intervals. "Of course, prior to our initial departure, I will be sending a recon unit which will be aided by Knight Captain Gallows, and Knight Captains Colvin and Dusk. Your job is recon, only engage if attacked. I want full reports on any organized towns and cities, tribes, military strength, and treatment of outsiders if possible. You will settle at the first checkpoint, then send back a small unit to report back your findings."

"Status report, drone." ED-E beeps then begins speaking in an audotory that is similar to that of a Sentry Bot "All units at Sector Alpha, Theta and Delta are running at optimal levels. Sector Echo units lost one Protectitron and three Robobrain units, and 2 Sentry bot units are operating at 62 percent optimal levels." Lillie frowns and looks at her pipboy. Sector Echo is her unit she sent to the former city of Lincoln, Nebraska. Not sure what kind of force the robots must of met there. "Drone, I want a full report regarding the damage the units sustained." ED-E beeps and responds "The damage to the units was the result of pulse weaponry. I am recieving a new report via transmission that the remaining 26 robotic units have been terminated." Lillie jumps to her feet from her chair "The hell do you mean by that?!" ED-E beeps "The units were performing patrols to lock down the area when they were all hit by an attack nearly simultaneously. Pulse weapons again. No unit is functional." Lillie smirks as she considers this news. Too organized or well equipped to be bandits, and she recalls the Brotherhood Elder Namara stating that there were Brotherhood locations to the east. Not unlike the last group of them she faced, they have superior firepower, and not unlike them, they would perish too.

Warren and his band of Raiders pick over the remains of the robots, scavenging all the electronic parts they can from the mess. He had learned from studying books how to repair and maintain tech, and his large band of Raiders started out as petty tech scavengers. Following the ousting of the Outcasts in Fort Independence, Warren and a small band of raiders risked a trip into the Capital Wasteland and made out with enough tech and armor to begin arming his troops. Intel from the Outcast base allowed the raider party to begin training in power armor. Upon the Enclave's defeat, Warren retreated west with his Raiders and plenty of the Enclave tech and encountered many Brotherhood of Steel bunkers all across the midwest, some empty. After some fights with the better armed but outnumbered BoS units at these bases, Warren began siezing the tech from these bunkers and weapons to arm his men. Warren befriended many hostile locals, scraping together a small military. He found himself at a manufacturing facility, where the Brotherhood was making very large, durable humaniod robots. After overpowering the units holding the facility, Warren and his men walked in, taking control and activating the robots. As he made his way west, Legion remnants pushed east, and many found the strength of the Raider-Commander to be impressive, and their only hope for survival.

Accompanied by a compliment of Securitrons all armed with rocket launchers above their monitors, an interchangable 40mm and 25mm grenade cannon on the left arm, and on the right arm various barrels designed to rotate, allowing the bot to swap between .308, 5.56 rounds and 5mm armor piercers. Some were armed with a gatling laser arm, plasma caster arm and tesla cannon right above the monitor. Lillie was quite impressed by the upgrades she obtained by putting the Think Tank to work for her. She crossed the Nebraska border and looked up to see a highway sign that had fallen over on one side, twisted, scorched and ruined like the rest of this godforsaken land. Spray painted on it was "Turn back Courier." And "Raider-Commander rules these lands." Lillie picks up her Ranger helmet and slides it over her head, picks up her LAER gun and turns to ED-E. "Looks like they are expecting us. I'd best introduce myself properly."

Lillie fires repeated shots from her spot behind the large boulder. With 3 Securitrons down she ordered them to tighten their formation and she would flank. The Raiders, however, were suprisingly smart. Their power armor was spray painted black (as was many signs marking their turf) with dark green markings painted across them that were unique to each individual, from flames to stripes and even old world tribal body art markings. Their pulse weapons were fearsome powerful against the securitrons, who's internals did not have EMP shielding because EMP shielding hampers performance. Lillie swaps out her LAER using her pipboy, since even the powerful laser weapon seems no match for the power armored Raiders. One Raider runs at her wielding a power fist and she switches to a balistic fist. He throws a strong right hook and their fists collide. His fist breaks, as does both their arms, and the shotgun blast hits his armor and some of the shrapnel manages to peirce the mesh covering his neck between the helmet and shoulderpads. He falls to the ground bleeding from the neck, and she ducks behind the rock and has to use her nose to navigate her pipboy as her right arm is broken and useless, crying out in pain until the stim hits her system and heals her arm. ED-E flies in and starts rapidly firing lasers at the Raiders until he is hit with a large caliber bullet and he is blasted to the ground. Lillie stops to survey the enviorment closely. The many boulders they dragged out beside the road provide them cover, and from the trench they dug further down they had snipers. The trailer just past that was probably their munitions store. This was the perfect frontlines. Only one option at this point, Lillie pulls out her Ranger Sequio and loads it with armor piercing bullets, triggering her implant and rushing out to the right flanking them and seemingly moving at super speed as she fires rounds at the raiders, running towards the trench. She ducks behind a boulder to reload, triggers her implant again and runs out, this time despite her faster speed she takes a few hits to the chest, arm and legs. She guns down the other raiders and just before her implant wears off she pulls a plasma grenade from each side of her trenchcoat, pops the buttons on the top, and tosses them in either side of the trench. A sniper with a 50 caliber gets one good shot on her stomach before the two grenades manage to blow up and liquify all the snipers in the trench.

A recon soldier runs into the camp frantically, battered and bruised, and out of breath he runs into James' tent, where James is typing up a message to send back to Moira back in Megaton. "Sir, our recon team fell under attack!" the knight barely manages to breathe as he tries to talk "Large... humaniod machines were guarding a warehouse. We came under fire and retaliated. Upon... Attempting to retreat we were flanked and ambushed by armored Raiders. All three Knight Captains are still alive as far as i know. Need... Backup" He finally collapses, having forced out his message. James stands, and strands of metal snake up across the mesh on his neck from the suit which runs across his face like liquid metal, until it forms a solid casing, a screen instead of a visor allows him to see where he is going and the fan on the back of the suit circulates air throughout the entire suit providing him with fresh clean air. He grabs his Alien Rifle from its case, anticipating a huge fight. After relaying the situation to Lyons, James runs to Fawkes' tent, who is cleaning his Gatling laser. "What is it you need, friend?" James smiles "Lets go Fawkes. We got bots to take care of."

When James arrives at the coordinates he finds a large warehouse building. From this warehouse laser fire is being shot at a smaller building 100 yards off. James and Fawkes start to work their way around the large building by trying to hide behind cover, but there is little cover save for the highway bridge they are hiding under. He pulls out his sniper rifle using his pipboy, surveying the building. "Sentry turrets. Hmm, those robots are unique, I've never seen more humanoid looking machines. They look almost like Brotherhood troops, except their armor is bronze colored and they are so much taller than a human." Fawkes shifts impatiently "We should not tarry long in this place.". James nods. "I'll try to snipe those turrets then we will rush in, you lay down heavy support fire. I'll push through towards the building where they are hiding out, then we will storm the building as a team." Fawkes nods and makes his way out into the open expanse. The turrets spot him and they turn their attention to Fawkes. The laser fire hits Fawkes but barely phases him and he returns it in kind with his Gatling laser. James fires a precision shot that blasts the targeting chip from the turret and it turns, firing at the turret next to it. Knight Captain Colvin fires a sniper bullet at another of the turrets and it explodes. Fawkes pelts both turrets firing at each other with laser fire and they explode in unison. James switches back to his alien rifle, storming towards the warehouse just as the factory door opens and out pours 5 large robots all wielding Gatling lasers. It begins to open fire on him and most lasers reflect off his armor, but an alert starts going off that the armor has sustained damage, as some of the lasers were able to superheat and melt some of the metal. The large blue projectiles from his rifle find their marks and he manages to blast an arm off one bot, a leg from another, a head from the middle one and legs off the other two. The center one explodes, causing a wicked chain reaction that takes out the other five.

As James picked over the factory, he found recent terminal entries that eluded to Warren, a man known as the Raider-Commander. There were several entries that mentioned many of James' victories over the Outcasts, the Enclave, and it seemed that this Warren was traveling almost at his heels, feeding off the scraps James left behind. James stared in shock at the unintentional destruction he had wrought, allowing these fiends access to antiquated technology. He lifts up the terminal, throwing it across the room where it busts apart against the opposite wall. Fawkes puts a hand on his shoulder and he nods up at Fawkes. "Lets get back to the base." After almost a half day of walking the surviving recon team along with James and Fawkes arrive back at the base camp just outside the Capital Progress' borders. Elder Lyons runs up to him and he sighs. "James, what happened?" He straightens up. "The mission has changed. There are a group of raiders out there led by a man known as the Raider-Commander Warren. He is dangerous, has access to advanced second hand technology, and he is a threat to peace and order. His surrender or death is the mission. Prepare your men for war."

Victor stands at the door to the Lucky 38 "Well howdy there Commander Lillie. The techs over at New Vegas Steel just turned out 25 more Sentry units and 15 more Protectitron units today. And we are expecting a huge shipment from the Big mt. research facility. And that special project you have been working on finally completed." Lillie nods "Good, prepare it for deployment." He follows her as she walks towards the elevator to her suite, ED-E at her heels "But ma'am, testin' is important at this stage..." "It doesn't need to be tested, if it was built properly to my specifications." The elevator closes carrying her up to her large rennovated suite. She picks through crates of weapons and gear, then takes a large metal card key from her nightstand, opening a door that was hidden seamlessly into the wall except for the almost invisible slit which the card key slid into. The card key was then spit back out into her hand and she smiles at the clean, shiny Gatling laser inside, its body a black titanium instead of steel and behind the barrel was not the focus optics of a regular gatling but rather plasma focus optics. The backpack was modified to allow continuous fire without need to reload by harnessing solar energy and converting it to fisson energy for the many batteries it had inside. The artificial solar lights she had on in the vault with the weapon allowed it to charge in storage. It hummed with energy and she smiles, grabbing it and the small toy gun from a shelf and the unique pump action holorifle and loaded her trenchcoat with pulse and plasma grenades. After a few hours rest she set out towards her camp just east of the Colorado.

The jet black robot stands at a mere 5 feet even. Human in appearence, its eyes are only a jet black visor salvaged from a TB-51 helmet. It has no mouth, nose or ears, its arms are thin but well plated with a round metal sphere for an elbow allowing for 360 degrees of rotation. Ports on the back allow for use of an internal jetpack and rockets are located at the bottom of the feet for extra thrust. The robot stares back at its designer, Lillie, visor filled with information such as wind speed, air pressure, humidity, radiation. It also shows Lillie's vitals including heart rate plus a description of her armor, including its composite materials and its weakpoints. Its voice is a metallic replica of Lillie's own voice. Lillie pulls out her Katana and the bot pulls a long blade from her back, it is similar to a katana but the blade is thicker and pulses with energy. Lillie rushes at the bot and slashes at her, it blocks her every strike attempt with clean presicion. Lillie keeps aggressively slashing at the bot until the bot swings back, slicing her katana in half. Lillie switches to her ballistic fist and two power fists form on the arms of the bot and it shealthes its sword, getting into a boxers stance. Lillie smirks "Now that doesnt seem fair". The bot steps forward a step "I wasn't designed to fight fair Commander Lillie." The bot throws a right and Lillie ducks it bringing up a right uppercut which the bot avoids by leaning back. It brings its left around and almost hits Lillie when she spins, linking its left arm in her left and hip tossing it, slamming it to the ground. It swings up at her from its prone position and Lillie stumbles back, allowing it to roll on its back slightly then spring back up on its feet. Lillie picks up a sledgehammer, swinging it at the bot and it ducks then swiftly strikes the center of the handle with its arm, snapping the wooden handle in half. The head flies over the bot and smashes into the wall, putting a hole through the drywall. It draws a silenced 45 auto from a hidden compartment on its thigh and stands, pointing it to Lillie's head. "Checkmate." Lillie nods "Alright, disengage.". The bot stashes its pistol and Lillie walks to a corner of her tent picking up the silenced 308 caliber sniper rifle from the ground, pained black as well. "You know your mission. Go give them hell." The bot takes the rifle "Affirmitive, Commander."

Laying on the cold ground did not bother the machine as it eyed a raider encampment through its sniper scope. It had just enough rounds in the magizine for each target out in the open. It fired 5 rounds, all quiet as the heavily modified weapon made almost no noise with each shot. She stands and makes her way towards the camp, all 5 human targets eliminated. She draws her thermic katana, moving quietly and preparing to engage the two robotic guards at each end of the camp. She runs at the first one and barely manages to dodge its plasma arm cannon blast before leaping in the air just above its shoulder and swinging its blade in an uppercut that diagonally slashes the robots head in half. She uses her jetpack to keep her airborne and as the other turns and runs towards its fallen mate. She drops down and slams down her blade, slicing it in half vertically. Both machines seems to spasm a bit and collapse, their body fire off sparks before wires extend to reconnect the seperated halves back together and they both stand, arms turning into swords. Lillie's assassin bot looks between the two, working to process this seemingly impossible feat. She leaps in the air as they both swing and flips behind one, kicking its head off and its head hits the other in the head. She lands and from her chest fire 2 pulse grenades that detonate on contact with the robots, and they stumble around and she dashes towards them slashing them both in half. A component inside the robot's chest detonates as they lay on the ground and she sheathes her thermic katana. She quickly leaves the scene after concluding that the robots were completely disabled and made for Commander Lillie's temperary base. "She isnt going to like this." the bot said aloud to herself as she ran tirelesly in the shadows of the night.

Warren walks through the large factory, sparks fly as mechanical arms work to piece together the large robots that made up the bulk of the muscle in Warren's military. He smiles and opens up a door that has a mini nuke hanging from a nail on the door. Sitting inside is a tall, slim redheaded girl polishing a missile launcher that is decorated with scratches signifying kill counts over most the body along with paint stripes and a skull and crossbone. She smiles up at him "Ah, its the great Raider Commander. A pleasure as always. I would hope that you would have work for me, its been weeks since I torched a family home, I was getting bored." Warren smiles, looking over her collection of explosive weaponry. "I do have work for you. You will love this job." She stands and slowly moves towards him, swaying her hips and then she puts her hands on his chest. "I love it when you talk dirty, chaos and mayhem makes me realize why I cannot leave this wonderful paradise of destruction." He brushes back her hair "Are you high right now?" He grins and she shrugs "Oh you know, only a lot." He takes her hand "Let me show you something Captain Rosalyn". He leads her into a small room and on one wall is a guass rifle, with an extended tesla coil barrel, where the battery goes in is a large revolving cylinder that holds 4 batteries, it has a grip just behind the barrel and the scope has been removed. She walks over slowly and grabs it up. "This is quite the weapon. A little heavy dontcha think?" He chuckles "You haul around a missile launcher. That fully automatic gauss pulse weapon will destroy any robotic enemy you encounter." She smiles "My target?" He leans against a wall "New Vegas. Raze it to the ground."

As Commander Lillie looks over the electronic printout schematics her assassin robot provided her, she frowns. "The redundancy backup hard drives and the multiple low yield generators make this a difficult target to put down. The EMP shielding is superb but prone to failure when the robot is performing its re-stitching process." ED-E floats over "Units in sector Beta, Omega and Alpha are falling under attack." Lillie leaps to her feet grabbing her LAER. "I want 4554451N there double time. Come on lets move!" She hurries out of her tent and on the horizon she sees the New Vegas skyline, smoke blotting out the sun from her camp opposite the Colorado. Her assassin bot runs past her and uses the propulsions in her feet and her jetpack to rocket across the water. The assassin bot pulls out its sword, quickly making its way north east towards the burning towers. Lillie grabs up her essentials and she makes a mad dash towards the speedboat she had rehashed together that sat at the rivers edge a half mile away.

Rosalyn laughs like a madwoman as she fires a rocket right through the front door of the Gomorrah and when it detonates it sets off her cleverly planned chain of C-4, the explosion almost taking her out as debris rains down "Whoa! Mentats and C-4 make for wonderful fireworks!" Her fellow raiders open fire on the bots rolling through the remnants of the gate and the compliment of robots, mostly sentry bots, fire a hail of bullets at the raiding party. Rosalyn picks up her guass rifle and fires a burst of 2-3 shots into each robot, easily frying them. She drops it down and picks up a frag grenade, kissing it before pulling the pin. "Tell your boss I said wassup, bitch?!" She tosses it at the disabled bots, the concussion from the blow causes their weakened internal components to malfunction, and they detonate forcefully. Debris from robots and buildings, along with the blood and gore of the scene is covering every inch of the ruined square. She sighs contently "It's good to be me right now." just as Lillie's assassin bot lands.

The small bot pulls her 45 and starts firing at the bandits, headshot after headshot leveling them, she reloads with blinding speed. A shotgun blast makes her miss her shot on Rosalyn and Rosalyn jumps and rolls, picking up the guass rifle and emptying the last of its ammo. The tiny bullets barely scratch the armor but the pulse effect and tesla effect knocks back the short bot into the pile of scrap. It gets back up as Rosalyn tosses a grenade at her. The bot spins and kicks the grenade back, it detonates in the middle of the remaining raiders, killing all but Rosalyn, who used a sentry bot chestplate as a shield. Rosalyn injects something into her arm from her pack and she pulls out her twin 12.7 pistols. "This here is Lou Lou. Say hello baby." She opens fire and the bot jetpacks at her closing the distance quickly and tackling her to the ground. Rosalyn, with insane strength, kicks the robot off and fires a few shots before the bot fires a grenade from its chest which she dodges but the blast slams her into the wall between north and south Vegas Strip, now mostly destroyed. As the bot draws her sword Rosalyn picks up the fuel tank from one of the flamethrowers a raider was using and throws it at the robot, which the robot slams the tank to the ground. Rosalyn smiles and pulls out a detonator, blowing up a small charge of C-4 planted on the canister. The blast knocks back the robot and blasts off its legs. Its sword lies on the ground near it and she picks it up, slashing off the bots head.

She holds the head up in victory "Alright boys, time to go home!" She looks around at her dead comrades. "Just me then? That's swell too. The boss is going to love this." As she made her way back east she traveled with her new sword in one hand, guass rifle in the other, and rocket launcher on her back. She heard a roar and heard the beast lumbering towards her and barely managed to block an attack from a deathclaw. It turns, swinging at her, but she drops the guass rifle and slashes off its hand. She marvels at the clean precise cut before quickly slashing the deathclaw in half diagonally. "Whoa, I love this! Best day ever! I will own the world with this new toy of mine!" Lillie walks closer "So, where did you get it?" Rosalyn stands in a relaxed stance, sword held in front of her, as Lillie wields a Ballistic Fist. Rosalyn shrugs "Oh, you know, I won it at the slots over at The Tops". She points a thumb towards the ruins of New Vegas and Lillie charges.

Lillie swings her ballistic fist at Rosalyn who rolls to the side, slashing at Lillie. Lillie backflips away and tosses a plasma grenade at Rosalyn in mid air. Rosalyn leaps to the side but is caught in the blast, fraying some of her armor. Lillie pulls out her holorifle and fires a couple shots at Rosalyn, one shot hitting her and blasting off her shoulder plate made from an old tire. She pulls out her 12.7 pistols and starts firing them at Lillie who's armor isn't able to hold up against the large rounds, Lillie takes a couple of shots before managing to duck behind cover. "You can't hide! I'll dismember you like I did your robot!" She fires a rocket at the rock and Lillie leaps out from cover, switching to her Recharger Gatling. Rosalyn throws a grenade and Lillie fires up her Gatling, shooting the grenade mid air and detonating it, knocking Rosalyn down, then using the laser weapon to saw off her leg. Lillie walks towards her, pulling the sword from her hand as her face is mangled by the grenade and her free arm clutches her leg, crying in pain. Lillie walks a distance away and pulls out the small toy gun, triggering it and the laser pointer paints Rosalyn the target. The ARCHEMEDIS blast leaves only scorched earth.

James fired several plasma rifle rounds at the raiders as they fired from cover, but these raiders were constantly evading, switching cover and ducking his plasma bolts. Even Fawkes had a hard time pinning them with his Gatling laser, Meanwhile he was eating a full course meal of lead, compliment of an automated turret and several raiders. As he opened fire on the turret, it would be switched off and from the raised platform a large metal piece would raise up to protect the turret from damage. The raiders would also use this reprieve to open unanswered fire on the monsterous mutant. Sniper fire from a far off ridge picked off a handful of raiders before the retreated inside, the windows all covered with cloth or boarded so the snipers could not assist. Fawkes falls to cover and holds his side "This does not look good my friend". James nods and he orders a retreat. The raiders, all too eager to finish the job, rush outside after them. James, the small unit of brotherhood, and Fawkes sprint across the wide expanse outside the large factory into an old parking lot, littered with abandoned cars. The raiders switched to using super sledges, to avoid detonating the cars, chasing them without keeping in mind the snipers. But they met no sniper fire. Instead, just past the lot James turns, hands in the air. "I surrender. I give up. You outnumber us. I can't win." The raiders draw back out their weapons, all trained on him as one steps forward. "Is that so. Just like that?" James smiles "Just like that." Suddenly comes the beeping of at least a dozen pulse mines and the raiders frantically look around just as they go off, setting off a hellish chain reaction that blasts even the tough Tb-51 armor open and launches James and his men back far.

After pulling himself back to his feet, he thanked Knight Captain Dusk and his team for their trap they placed, as they healed up at their established base camp outside Detroit. Their push forward was draining the Capital Progress, but Pittsburg steel was backing them and they sent for mechanics and metalworkers to join them and settle the factories they had fought through along the way. Days passed and James found himself just outside Kansas City, Missouri. He thought back to a book he had read. About the settling of America, and how history was made here. A trail started here that settled the rest of the west. Well, not just a trail, but three trails. He had one road to follow, and this one road would lead him to correct an accident he made years ago. He watched the sun set with his rifle on his shoulder.

Warren looks through his scope at the large Brotherhood camp, flag flying above the tent. He puts on his Telsa helmet and his armor hums with energy. His large army of robots slowly makes their way towards the camp. Without warning, they begin opening fire on the camp. The weapon fire is returned, and across the expanse that seperated the two factions there was little, save for the lasers, plasma and bullets that now was hailing down upon both sides. James, after hearing the gunfighting start, snaps to attention, grabbing his rifle and scoping out the battlefield. He sees the massive robots and on a ridge overlooking the mayhem is a man in Tesla armor. James runs out of the tent and Elder Lyons grabs his arm. "Where are you going James?" His visor turns on. "I'm going to end this war, and I am going to take care of this Raider-Commander."

Warren and James stand across from each other, neither armed, and Warren motions to James to attack with one finger. "This is what I've been waiting for, a little one on one with the legend himself. Story is you can kill a deathclaw with your bare hands." James chuckles "That so? Hate to disappoint, but I'd never try anything that stupid." Warren nods "And yet here you are, unarmed." James shakes his head "Not quite." Fawkes barges through the brush behind Warren, having used the rocks and brush to flank him. He swings his massive fist at Warren who turns to see the massive fist hit his chest, denting his armor and breaking a couple of Fawke's knuckles. The Tesla coils on his armor activate and he fires an electric pulse at Fawkes, blasing him back, then rushes in slugging him in the stomach rapidly. He kicks Fawkes to the ground and turns to face James. "What do you think? I modified this armor with parts from some pulse weaponry to allow it to do amazing stuff to my body." James nods. "Impressive. But can you dodge?" James rushes at him and Warren dodges most of his punches. Both swinging at each other with jabs, hooks, and uppercuts, neither was able to land a blow until Warren's suit discharged blasting James away from him. Fawkes rushes back in and swings his super sledge which Warren ducks and he kicks Fawkes in the leg so hard with a sweep kick he shatters the mutants kneecap, despite all his muscle. Fawkes down, James rushes in and lands a heavy elbow to Warren, blasting off his helmet. Warren manages to avoid the powerful strikes aimed at his face and kicks James back, retrieving his helmet quickly. James tackles him into a rock and starts aggressively pounding away at the heavy armor, cracks soon forming, until Warren knees him in the visor so hard his visual screen is interupted and he doesnt see the follow up kick to the chest that sends him flying back into the dirt. James' visor melts back and he stands slowly, sliding behind a rock as he holds a pulse grenade behind his back. Warren walks to Fawkes. "Come out, or I fry your mutant friend here." James pokes his head up "Who me? Since you asked nicely..." He throws the grenade and Warren fires an electric pulse from his suit at the grenade.

The men in the bar gave the Desert Ranger a wide berth as she sat at the bar, putting her helmet on the table. "Double shot of whiskey." The bartender slides her a glass of amber woe and she lays her Ranger Sequioa on the bar, making it clear she had no intention of paying "You stop when I say I've had enough, ya hear?" The bartender nods and she smiles, drinking the whole glass in one gulp and slamming the glass down. The bartender hurries to pour her another glass and through a door walks a man in full Tb-60 power armor. Without looking she grabs back up her sidearm. "Took you long enough to find me. I wasn't exactly running." James shrugs "Well, Lillie, you weren't exactly standing out in the open yelling 'hey come kill me!', so I had to come look for you." She stands slowly, draining her shot and turning to face him "So I understand you killed the Raider-Commander. Not really that tough if you ask me, if you managed to defeat him." James leans against the back wall "You wanna trash talk all day, or do you wanna fight?"


End file.
